Letters From OC Weekly Readers

Letters may be edited for clarity and length. E-mail to letters@ocweekly.com, or mail to Letters to the Editor, c/o OC Weekly, 1666 N. Main St., Ste. 500, Santa Ana, CA 92701. Or fax to (714) 550-5908.

WHAT A DRAINI’ve had the pleasure to work on many coastal-runoff projects with Hasan Nouri and soon shared his frustrations trying to fix gullies and creeks [Matt Coker’s “War & Water,” Dec. 12]. This man has called every shot right and has a great passion for his work, country and native Afghanistan. The bottom line for the coastal projects were that developers—like, say, the Irvine Co. or Phillip Morris—would hire a guy like Hasan to look at drainage courses and watersheds in their projects. And if they had to pay more to fix a “ticking time bomb,” the reports got buried, and the consultant was usually threatened to keep his mouth shut or lose their business. Our cities follow the same code of ignorance: “Don’t fix it until it’s broken!”

APPLAUSEThe OC Music Awards are going to be epic in ’09 [Chris Ziegler’s Aural Reports, “Rewarding Position,” Dec. 12]. I’m so happy for Luke Allen taking over the awards; he’s going to do a great job.

YOU KNOW WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT ASSUMINGHow stupid can you be to assume all Mexicans are automatically Indian [Gustavo Arellano’s ¡Ask a Mexican! Dec. 12]? I don’t care about the Virgin of Guadalupe either because I am a protestant. So I guess Mexico only has mariachi/norteño as their national music? Mexico has a lot more music than what you think solely constitutes as “Mexican” music. Maybe you get confused for a Mexican because a lot of Mexicans aren’t of [native-to-Mexico] Indian descent. Then again, what is Mexican? Mexican is a nationality, not an ethnicity, you dumbass. Mexico is a nation filled with different cultures, with a population that is 70 percent to 80 percent mestizo (European-Indian descent). I think the problem with people today is that they are not cultured in different groups/countries. I understand that it can get annoying to be mistaken for another group of people. But get this: We’re all human. Shit, I’d rather be mistaken for a human being than a damn monkey. Nothing wrong with being Native Indian, if you are. But I guess being Indian makes you stupid still, just as the Early Spaniards considered the Natives to not be human. The ignorance continues.

MONEY MANWhile I appreciate your journalistic rigor as you tell this story from a neutral point of view [Vickie Chang’s “Less of Mor,” Nov. 21], I must correct your characterization of Anton Posniak’s move from Los Angeles to Orange County: It was not a move to explore new markets, but rather a flight from a place where he had burned all credibility to a place where he could cull fresh victims. The last time I saw Anton was in Santa Monica, he did what he did best: asked me to meet to discuss an important matter, then asked for money. Here is Anton’s m.o.: He finds people who don’t know about him, he charms them into giving him money, he takes their money and uses it for his own purposes, then he moves on. As was correctly observed here, the majority of his victims don’t have the money to sue him effectively. And those who do sue him end up with nothing but lawyers’ bills because there are so many suits against him. Anyway, Anton has found a nice little niche to exist in, where the law doesn’t seem to be bothered enough to come after him. Although Orange County is naturally more sheltered, and thus more naive, than Hollywood, as evidenced by the respectful tone of this article, your innocence won’t last long, and I’m glad OC Weekly has begun exposing this continuing tragedy.

POLICING THE POLICEWhat the F@#K is going on over there with the Garden Grove P.D. [Nick Schou’s “Push Comes to Shove,” Nov. 28]? To all representatives of authority: Pull your heads out of your asses! When you are blessed with a great amount of responsibility and act ungrateful and irresponsible, it makes your entire team look bad. And that goes for you, too, Mr. I’m-going-to-cover-for-Officer-Patel. I mean, what’s that all about? You put the guy through a few classes and say everything is golden, and then send him back out to commit the same bad behaviors all over again. I think the entire department should be re-staffed and everyone be investigated. Protect and Serve, my ass!